Chapter 21 of PSYCHOMarketing by Roger Nichols
Abraham Maslow was the 20th century American psychologist best known for his theory of psychological health, which was based on what he called the “Hierarchy of Needs” (1908-1970). To reach it, he identified and then sorted the needs of human beings into different categories. For example, some needs, he said, were simply basic, while he ranked others as high as “self-actualization.” Maslow believed it was only when basic needs were satisfied that a person would be able to express even the desire to fulfill any of his higher needs. These are his categories:
Physiological
These needs are basic, biological, and physical: sleep, water, food, warmth, breathing, sex, and others. When there is need to fulfill any of these, the desire spikes and a person is hardly able to do anything else or fulfill any other need. This is why people find it difficult to be productive when they are hungry. Hunger must be prioritized above all other needs.
Safety
People generally want to feel safe everywhere they are, that’s why airbags—which more often go unused—are installed in new cars. This category comes immediately after biological needs. However, safety, as it is used here, goes beyond avoidance of danger. People want to feel safe physically, emotionally, psychologically, and socially. When one does not feel safe, as a result of a job or family loss, vulnerability and insecurity set in.
Social
Human beings generally want to be accepted and loved by others. We all have a fundamental need for human contact, as it is these emotional support systems that help us through crises. Also, people who are involved with others tend to be healthier. These needs are met by establishing relationships with others with whom we share a common interest. It is the desire to be accepted and to build ties with the people in our age group, profession, school, neighborhood, etc.
Esteem
The need for esteem is a person’s longing to be admired and respected. As individuals, we want to be loved, respected, and embraced by others. Confidence makes us more creative and generous. It is the desire—need—to be proud of ourselves.
Self-Actualization
This, according to Maslow, is the highest need people can aspire to. We all want to be fulfilled and feel that we are making good use of our lives. This is why a homeless person’s needs are different from those of an opera singer who has just had her first break. The homeless person will be more bothered with basic biological and security needs, like water, food, and housing, while the opera singer will be more concerned about social and esteem needs.
Similarly, the homeless person is motivated by the need to stay alive, which is intrinsic, while the opera singer’s motivation is extrinsic: She wants people to appreciate the artistic talent she has invested in, as well as to be famous and acknowledged by others. According to Maslow, it is not until after the homeless person gets food, shelter, and job security that his or her orientation can move to the next phase–the need to interact with others—which will automatically follow. Thereafter, he or she would further develop interest in pursuing their next higher need, which is esteem, and, subsequently, self-actualization.
Maslow famously declared that, “The story of the human race is the story of men and women selling themselves short.” He was inspired by the research of Erich Fromm, a humanistic psychologist who believed the craving for self-actualization is very important for human beings. Maslow also built on the works of earlier psychologists, like Skinner and Freud, who focused more on basic human instinct, and the advanced researches of Jung and Fromm, who traced the desire for happiness. Maslow wanted to know what made people happy and why they had fulfilled the needs they had.
Ironically, Maslow himself had a sad and frustrated life before he found himself. His father was not physically accessable to him, and this had an effect on his life. He openly expressed his disgust for his mother, calling her “schizophrenogenic,” cruel, and ignorant. He was also Jewish in an anti-Semitic community, and this affected his social skills as well. He was on probation in his first year at school, and he spent one semester at Cornell University.
Even so, Maslow was optimistic for humanity, despite his own experiences. He seemed to have a feeling that human beings were innately good, despite the chaos that marked the world at that time, and he followed that feeling with studies that proved him right. For his theory, he used the word “hierarchy” to distinguish the relationship between needs. The top of his pyramid relies on the base for support, and this is evident in the diagram that depicts the theory. For him, the peak of human experience is “tremendous intensification of any of the experiences in which there is a loss of self or transcendence of self.”